


Worst Case Scenario

by paranoidangel



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2018-03-08 21:50:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3224699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paranoidangel/pseuds/paranoidangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eve Baird's job is to protect the librarians.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Worst Case Scenario

When it happened, Eve was in the bathroom. She'd just soaped her hands when there was a crash, a more familiar-sound of books hitting the floor, and then a scream. Seconds later, Eve was at the door of the main room, gun in her still-wet hands. It was long enough ago everything was quiet now. However, that didn't mean the threat had gone.

Eve eased the door open. Flynn's desk was on its side, legs towards her, its contents spilled onto the floor. From her position she could see a pair of legs and a hand thrown out. From the pants she could tell it was Jenkins. But not why he was slumped against the desk. Or what had happened to him. The position of his hand and the tang of blood in the air told her it was nothing good.

If whoever - or whatever - had done this and gone, the LiTs would be around, worrying over Jenkins. So as much as she wanted to check on Jenkins she had to leave him and find the perpetrator before they found anyone else.

Unless they were hiding very well, there was no one else down here. She kept to the edge of the room, heading for the stairs. A couple of steps up were enough for her to be able to glance over at Jenkins. There was a dagger with a bronze hilt sticking out of his chest. It was the same one she'd seen him examining earlier. So whoever did it, hadn't come with a weapon, which made things a easier. But only a little, given the number of weapons in the Annex.

As she ascended the stairs, she put Jenkins out of her mind with the ease of years of practice. But her grip was slipping on her gun and she dried her hands on her pants legs, one at a time. She'd made it halfway up when there was another scream, followed by a thud.

Without hesitating, Eve ran lightly up the rest of the stairs. At the top she found Jones lying between the shelves directly ahead of her, blood was pooling under his head. She kept her eyes on the rest of the room as she crouched beside him. Either she couldn't find his pulse or he had none to find.

Almost worse was the knowledge that the shelves were visible from the staircase. Either whoever killed him was fast and quiet, or they were invisible. She'd learned enough not to discount the latter assumption. But even someone invisible had to make themselves known sometime. No one could be completely silent. Eve took a deep breath and kept still, listening.

With it being so quiet in here, she could hear the distant sound of traffic coming from outside. Inside there was an ever-present hum from the computers and other electrical devices in the Annex. The only person she could hear was herself, her heartbeat loud in her ears.

She let out her breath and resumed her slow, silent walk. Her senses on alert, she tensed at heavy footsteps from up ahead. Unwilling to fire blindly when she didn't know where Stone and Cassandra were, she paused, gun held ready.

Then Stone came around a corner and stumbled into her. She grabbed him instinctively, with one hand around his arm, but couldn't prevent him from slumping to the ground. She let him go and stepped back, alert in case his attacker was right behind. But there was no one there.

Her hand was sticky with his blood. He had spots of it on him, enough that she couldn't tell where he was wounded. Or how much of it was his. There was no weapon, so whoever had attacked him was now armed. And she didn't know with what.

Cassandra was still around somewhere. Still alive, hopefully. Maybe hiding, if she had any sense. Eve had to make Cassandra a priority: save the one person still alive and worry about the dead or dying later.

Not wanting to be ambushed, she changed her tactics. "Why don't you show yourself?"

Cassandra sidestepped from the shelves to Eve's right. Eve swung round to point her gun at her. But Cassandra had her hands up and a line of blood across her throat.

The hairs on the back of her neck stood up, but she didn't turn round yet. "Who did this to you?"

Cassandra pointed in the direction she'd come from before she fell.

Eve spun, rather than catch her, but there was only blackness behind her. She was unable to stop herself falling into it.

When she hit the ground it was the floor of the Annex with Cassandra beside her, looking concerned.

She blinked. "Cassandra?" There wasn't a mark on her. The blood could have been faked but why would Cassandra do that? She wouldn't - and that was confirmed by the sight of Stone and Jones also on the floor nearby.

Cassandra smiled at Eve, then went over to Jones as he sat up.

Jenkins was across the room, standing by Flynn's desk, which was now back in its usual place. With the usual mess on it.

Something had gone on that she didn't understand and she didn't like it. "What just happened?" She stood, hoping that Jenkins or Cassandra could explain everything. Or alternatively, why the afterlife looked like the Annex.

Stone stood too and reached out for a cardboard box which was on the table in the middle of the room, but hadn't been there earlier.

"Don't touch that," Jenkins shouted, and Stone pulled his hand back as if the box was hot.

"What is it?" Stone asked, peering at it suspiciously.

"It's a parcel," Jones replied, in an easy tone, standing up and joining them. Eve narrowed her eyes at him. "It's from Amazon."

Jenkins sighed. "I should have known it would be you."

"What is it?" Eve stepped closer, more frustrated at the lack of answers than Jones lack of common sense at the moment.

"Hades' Nightmare Hex," Jenkins finally explained. "From the Amazon jungle, not the internet retailer. It makes your nightmares come alive."

That made sense. She'd had the occasional nightmare about losing the LiTs.

"All it needed was for one person to accept it and everyone in the building would be affected." Jenkins glared at Jones, who at least looked a little guilty.

"It wasn't that bad," Jones complained. "Okay, so I ended up in prison, but you guys would have sprung me eventually. And it's not as if anyone died."

Lucky for him.

"It's related to what you were doing at the time, not just some random nightmare of monsters under the bed."

Jones coughed and studied his shoes. Eve decided she didn't want to know. Neither was she going to ask about whether monsters under the bed were real. One nightmare per day was enough.

"And once the nightmare's over, that's it?" Stone asked.

"No." Jenkins shook his head. "It can only be switched off manually. And since the device doesn't appear in nightmares, that can be somewhat tricky. Unless you have someone unaffected by it." He looked over at Cassandra, who gave a small, embarrassed smile.

"I only have one nightmare and it already came true."

"Don't take this the wrong way," Eve said, "but I'm glad."

Cassandra smiled properly. "For once I'm glad too."


End file.
